That Counterintuitive Way To Get Clarity Back In Your Life And Business

If your numbers in your business are going up and you “hustle” every day, you are heading full speed towards a wall.

Which is a bit odd… how is it that success leads to you running straight into a wall?

Well, that depends on where you stand.

If you are the one doing the running, you might look at the situation from inside and just celebrate every month for smashing those sales quotas.

But the reality might be a bit differently. Here’s why.

Last week I had this chat with a client about something quite counterintuitive that actually made him gain more clarity in the business.

And when we were having this conversation, it really fascinated me about what these things were. Not in the sense of the specific details of what worked for him. But in general, why the fact that they were counterintuitive, and they worked.

We were sat in my office and we were discussing how far he had come in this business.

We’ve been working together on this for about three months. And every month we meet up to strategize the next steps and make sure we’re going along the right track.

And he started telling me about how, six, seven months ago he was doing these things that were getting him the results he wanted.

He thought they’re working. And in a sense, they kind of were working. They’re working in a way that kind of that got him so far. And that sense of that distance gave him a sense of success.

But when you really break them down into what they were, there wasn’t really much alignment between his life and his business.

He would end up working 12-14-15-20 hour days to try and get to that mythical four hour work week.

And because he was putting so much effort and time into this business, he was missing out on so many other aspects of his life.

Things like watching his daughter grow up…

Having a date night with his wife…

Just being able to watch some Netflix and keep up to date with the latest season of Power. Because Power is one of the best shows in the world FYI.

I don’t know if these things sound to you like your normal Friday nights. But for him, these small acts of love were luxuries.

Some high-performers might look at this scenario and say this is a necessary evil to be able to build your business and your future.

And that’s where the counterintuitive methods come in. I’ll get to that in a bit.

So, he was telling me these stories of how he would get home and just feel like he wanted to go straight to bed, because he wanted to get up and go straight to work.

Not go to bed because of exhaustion. But go to bed, because he wanted to go to work and build his business.

Isn’t this like the goal of any high-performer? To love his job so much that he just can’t wait to go back into the trenches?

Which if you’re talking to me, and you, perhaps sounds kind of normal.

You want to put the time in your business and you want to build it, you want to grow it, you want to make sure that you’e putting enough time into it to make it a success.

Because at the end of the day, you’re the only one that can make anything successful in your life.

So, I started asking him about what’s his routine look like? When he’s at work, when he’s in his office, building his business.

And he sat there and he just stared out the window behind me and he was reliving probably the last 12-18 months with life on a daily basis.

He had the exact same daily routine in the last 12-18 months. You might think that that’s the way to go.

Discipline is the only way to grow and build a business.

But are you sure you aren’t missing out on some things?

Then he kind of stopped, he just stopped and stared, and thought… “this isn’t working”.

With 18-hour to 20-hour days, the excitement to go to work wasn’t really working for him.

How come?

Everybody measures success differently. For some, it might be revenue and sales.

For others it’s freedom.

But most people measure their success in “Why?”

Why am I doing this? Why am I working 18 hour days? My client has a family. And his “why” is being able to provide everything for them.

But at what expense? Not being there for them?

You might be in the situation right now. You’re growing your business, you’re taking your business to the next step, to the next stage, to whatever that is.

And you’re very much in it.

You’re thinking so much about what’s going on in the minute detail. You’re forgetting everything else, you’re not allowing yourself to really step out and look at what’s going on.

He was telling me about the fact that he was so in it, so in that cycle of going to work, building the business, getting the sales and building the teams up, getting to the first million and beyond…

All these facts and figures and goals that he keeps achieving, but didn’t realize that he was kind of achieving nothing at the same time.

Because if you’re building something like that, you’ve got to make sure you’re building something of value.

Not so much perhaps value to everyone else, because that’s a given.

But something of value to you and to your “Why”.

Why wasn’t he able to realize this before?

Because he never stopped. He was too focused on “hustling” and “getting things done” that he forgot to stop and ask “why?” and “at what cost?”

It’s only when he was sat there and he could look back into the situation that he realized that wasn’t working for him.

When we started working together, one of the things that came out for him was, he just felt overwhelmed.

He just felt like he was in this rat race of a situation with his own business.

One of the things that we worked on when we first started working together was actually just: “what’s going on.”

What’s going on in the business right now.

What’s going on in your life right now.

What’s working and what’s really not.

And that was the first time that he allowed himself to stop and think and listen and look.

And he could see that a lot of his methods weren’t really working. They weren’t working in the sense where he wouldn’t need them to get to his long-term plan.

They were working for getting some sales in and pay the rent and pay salary. That was working. But it wasn’t working in the wider scheme of the picture.

And now he knows exactly what needs to be changed. He has the ability to see what’s really going on.

Only from that point, you can truly build a strategy that can help you get to where you want to be in business, and of course your life.

So the counterintuitive methods for him weren’t working because they’re exactly that.

Just stop and ask yourself “what’s going on?”

And I want you now to try and just stop and pause and look at what you’re truly doing.

How much clarity do you have in your business? How much clarity do you have in your life? And how much clarity could you have?

Is an 18-hour work day really what you want?

Because where you are right now could be an amazing space.

So… what’s next for you? What’s the next step?

And if you’re sat there now thinking: “I’m that person, I’m that client. I’m just in this rat race with my own business”, you really need to stop for a moment, just pause and allow yourself to really see what’s going on, what’s working, what’s not with the strategy are you currently using?

And from there, you can build the framework to build the strategies that work for you.

There’s no Strategy-In-A-Box. Because everybody is wired differently.

So that’s my little story for you. And I really hope that found something to take away from it.

Perhaps you resonate with it and if you do tell me. I love hearing from you.

Let me know in the comments below

What is your big “Why” and what’s the big take away that will make you PAUSE and be there for your it?

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